


All That Is Winter

by 13letters



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: "he couldn't forge a fork", Crying, F/M, GENDRY HAS THIGHS LIKE ANVILS, GODDAMN I MEAN DID YOU SEE GENDRY JUST RUN AND RUN, Gendry "I Can't Feel My Feets" Waters, Hating Each Other, Jon Snow is nOT GETTING PAID ENOUGH, Jorah is the Bear that inspired "The Bear and the Maiden Fair" I bet, Let This Roadtrip Never End, Spoilers for 07:06, Teamwork makes the dream work, The Fellowship of the Wight, The Seven Best Friends, The Seven Gods, but most importantly, finding themselves on this adventure, finding true friends in each other., generally only the seven of these goobers talking it out, running through the snow
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-21
Updated: 2018-10-04
Packaged: 2018-12-18 02:27:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11864718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/13letters/pseuds/13letters
Summary: They each press on. Gods have mercy on them all.





	1. one

**Author's Note:**

> Oh, my goodness. No one asked, but here we are -- I hope you all enjoy this nonsense and aren't too disappointed! They are the #DreamTeam, and I love them and always want to write them always. 
> 
> Enjoy, and look out for more soon!
> 
> #TeamworkMakesTheDreamWork

"Alright," Jon called a little too loudly now that the wind's quieted down. He braced himself, feet in the snow, and he -- 

\-- he finds himself thinking about Ygritte, against his every damned inclination, every seventh sin with the eighth and the worst by far, let this be the trial and irony his champion: _hope_. He had forgotten. 

Just how much the chill of frozen, frigid air in his lungs feels like a kiss, like the quiet sting of wind on his cheeks feels like _her_ who he still can't lay to rest after all this time, after death, after life. 

"Alright," he says again, softer almost, and he's never been one for pomp and ceremony, speeches that compel and provoke. He can't believe he's here beyond the Wall and its magnificence, standing beyond it like she had once stood atop it. He still feels like the look on her face. 

"I don't know about you lot," Gendry calls, blue eyes piercing ahead through trees and through snow. "But I feel inspired."

"Great," the Hound mocks. He's been rocking from place to place where he stands and as he walks for all of the last mile. With his sullen, grumpy expression, he looks very cross indeed. "You can go find the fucker yourself."

"I just might," Gendry snaps back. He holds his hammer too menacingly for someone so at ease, he -- he's still the fifteen year old boy that had to hold her back as she screamed _Burn in hell!_ and _He killed Mycah!_ so broken that it tore his fragmented heart in two. 

No different than Sandor, though, not really, as neither of them have learned to forgive. 

Through chattering teeth, Sandor snarls with no heat at all (he's turning blue), "What are you waiting for, then? A kiss?"

"I don't trust these men, Jon Snow," Tormund decides right then and there. He's graced them all with his confidant assurances every few minutes for the past hour. "I trust your authority," he's so quick to clarify, voice lowered even though it carries across the snow, "I trust your leadership. But we've no Red Woman to bring you or them back if they kill each other."

"On the contrary," Thoros of Myr begins tactfully, raising his flask. "I happen to be --"

"You shut your godsdamn mouth, you fucking bald cunt, I _swear_."

"Easy, dog," Jorah oh-mercies, looking as nonchalant as possible with all them furs around his face. "We should keep moving before nightfall, cover more ground, find more shelter."

"I told you," Tormund spits so suddenly it's almost hilarious. "I won't take orders from the Old Bear's boy. Distrustful goat. Look at his whiskers; would you trust him?"

Self-consciously, Thoros flattens his hand atop his hood. 

Gendry just glares at the falling snow and thinks of the warm forge he gave up in bloody warm King's Landing. "Well," he begins, intelligently. 

Hours ago, he had laughed so happily that even Ser Jorah and Thoros of Myr had joined in with him when he stepped beyond the Wall for the first time and found so much snow he swore it was magic. The good kind. 

He just laughed and laughed for the next five minutes until he wasn't laughing anymore, as cold started to kill and capsize his lungs a bit, as Tormund made a sad face and spoke, _I bet he's first Southron to lose his toes. Or his ears._

_No,_ Jon had denied. Even though his time on the Watch taught him better. Better men have fallen, and though none of them know it yet, better men still will on this venture. 

"North?" Beric asks no one in particular, gazing through the storm like it's a fire. 

"I don't know." Jon just can't help himself. "Did you bring a map, my lord?"

Who throws the snow at his back, he isn't quite sure, and neither are the other six they claim when he turns around looking so tired. So cold. 

When Tormund says that it's northwards they walk unless any of them want to go back home where it's safe and it's warm -- not like he's judging any of them but not unlike he's offering tactic permission either, like he wishes he could himself almost -- 

They each press on. Gods have mercy on them all.


	2. two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "What?"
> 
> "What?" echoes Jon.
> 
> "What?" wonders Tormund, gazing at them all like he's _living_ for this elusive disdain.

"Her hair is yellow as the sun," Tormund continues, telling it to any of them that will listen: the wonder that is Brienne of Tarth, the fairest maiden all around the flat world. "Her shoulders are so broad, there's no doubt as to her strength."

"Is this a maiden or an aurochs?" Jorah quips, calling the words over his shoulder.

"She sounds fearsome."

"She'd have you on your back in seconds," the Hound warns Gendry, scowling. "Bloody wench."

"She's the most beautiful thing I've ever beheld," Tormund insists. "The thought of her warms my parts."

"Lord of Light," Beric swears. Sandor can't help his sigh. "Don't speak so crass in front of the child."

"I beg your pardon." Kicking through the snow, Gendry frowns at his back.

"We knew you as a sullen boy. Not much has changed."

"Not always sullen," Thoros disagrees, grinning in that drunken way that's almost lighthearted, that's almost summer in an airy hall of acorns: ale, laughter, singing, a dress on the girl, bullheaded laughter ringing from the forge. "Someone could make him smile, I remember."

"Young love," Beric says nonchalantly, like that hasn't been everything Gendry has tried to avoid thinking of directly; he almost couldn't keep it to himself like a memory of a secret long buried, _Jon. I knew her. I knew your sister. You smile just the same, and I would die to see it on her face again,_ he almost will, this knight of summer, "Gendry, we're just hacking on you."

"Young love is a bitter thing," Jorah frowns. But come to think of it, so is old love, and he genuinely believed he might never see his Queen again. 

"I might have killed the last man who was hacking on me."

"It's too cold to cower, but believe me, I'm _terrified_."

"Who was she?" Jon wants to know as he slows his gait. It won't exactly be comforting to know this man might see a ghost, too, in sunshine instead of in snow, around each rock and over each crest of wind. But he's finding he has less and less friends, and this Gendry --

"Gendry," Sandor gapes, so stricken that he and a few of the others turn to look at him. He spoke his name like he just realized it, like once upon a couple years ago as they warmed in front of a fire and ate a rabbit, he asked her, _What the fuck's a Gendry?_ and life just. Keeps kicking him in the balls. "You have to be joking."

"What?"

"What?" echoes Jon.

"What?" wonders Tormund, gazing at them all like he's _living_ for this elusive disdain.

The Hound's still staring at Gendry when impatiently, shivering, he begins again, "What --" before he quickly cuts him off.

"Her. The Stark bi-- bit of skirt."

"Sansa?" asks Jon, squinting at him. "You know Sansa?"

"No," Sandor grimaces. He fucking hates gingers. "Knew the girl."

"Arya," Gendry clarifies slowly, looking to Jon like this has to be it, the end of his life, surely. He could say he meant to tell the King sooner, but he also meant to stay with Arya, too, he meant _you would be m'lady_ , her, _Arya_ , forever, and he meant to tell him more tactfully. Less abrasive, more private and without an audience at the end of the world. "We were children," is all he thinks to say, is all he knows how to explain just yet. That he had felt like a brother to her while also decidedly not being brotherly at all, that -- that maybe if they'd had more time they might have.. well, nothing. It's all just a bastard's wishes. And once again, she's a princess. 

"She was a pain in the ass," the Hound eloquently interprets. "Both of them."

"You address the King, tall man," Tormund says.

Sandor doesn't even simper. "Piss on the king. Piss on your loyalty. How stupid are you to have come out here with him? We're all a bunch of fools."

"And there's the traitorous fool," Beric says to Gendry. "Don't stand too close."

"The Queen doesn't yet recognize your king," Jorah tells Tormund. "I honor the love you show him, though. Official or not, any man that inspires such loyalty must be true."

"All the Free Folk are in love with pretty King Crow," Tormund grins. "If they don't want to be him, they want to be with him. Passionately," he elaborates since Thoros is making eyes at him. 

"So did the red witch with King Stannis," Gendry snarks. "If that's loyalty, no thank you kindly. There was no honor in anything they did."

"If she came at _me_ with none of her clothes on."

"My sisters," Jon murmurs to himself. Clegane stands stoic and silent and _angry_ , Jon thinks. Or maybe just what Tormund described him as. Sad. 

Gendry looks it, equal parts sad and tired and shamed and frozen. Like he had the right of it originally, he does see a ghost or has been plagued by what could have been one. 

Jon wants to know everything about them, but then he reckons they might want to know everything about them, as well. And at some point, the coming winter becomes family, _duty_ , and honor, the task at hand so important he's no time to feel like tears are eyes on his cheeks. That these men might have known those girls when he couldn't, had protected or watched or even loved them when he couldn't, that time -- 

Is not just a lonely, desolate thing. 

"We'll return to Winterfell," he swears to them. And it might not be the same, but to Ser Jorah he says, "I'm sure your niece would cherish meeting you."

Bless him, the Young Bear almost stumbles. "Lyanna?"

"A cursed name," Thoros of Myr observes, taking a long swig.

"Says Thoros of Where who talks to fire like some crazed simpleton," Tormund scowls. 

Sandor actually snorts. 

"Jon Snow tells us you fucked a bear, though," Beric points out. 

Quite proudly, he just stares off into the distance. "That I did."

"The bear and his man fair," Gendry wonders, kinda just. Trying not to think of the anatomy and the -- gods. "Not as musical."

"It's no featherbed either, is it?"

"Try a small bed of straw," he corrects. 

"At least you had a bed, lad."

"By the heat and the smoke of the smith, ashes and cinder everywhere when I woke, my lungs full of soot."

"Sounds like a quick death by a few years," Jorah says. "Were you paid well as a smith?"

"Not particularly," Gendry says. It's as modest and as least forthcoming as he can be when he suddenly doesn't want to sound too lowly in front of the king.

"A blacksmith?" Tormund asks him. 

It takes Gendry a beat to reply, "Yes. In King's Landing."

Tormund only looks him over. Uncomfortably, Sandor moves away from him while Jon resigns not to smile. "What do you make of him?"

"I've my doubts he could forge a fork," Tormund testily decides.

Gendry all but chokes. "Alright now, _ser_ , I --"

"You think I'm a knight, pretty boy?"

"He is pretty," Beric reflects to no one in particular. It's just that the dead have risen in Gendry like the ghost of Renly Baratheon at the King's Hand's tourney years ago. He remembers. 

But gods above, that diversion is all it took. "You know who's truly pretty," Tormund tells them all. 

How quickly they set off again is a testament to intolerance. 

"Brienne of Tarth," the Hound gripes. 

"With her hands like honey hams."

"Again, a lady or an aurochs?" Jorah _almost_ laughs, just walking on.


	3. three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Alright," Gendry cuts in. "If we're dead either way, what harm can a fire really do? I can barely see five feet in front of me."
> 
> "Feet," Tormund repeats. "Look a man in the eye, lad. Don't be staring at his feet."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, lovelies, for your support! And have this chapter to treat your broken hearts; I'm hurting, too.

"If you don't quit that humming," Jon sighs, 'cause he really can't take much more of it. Ygritte was right about all of it, and each step further into winter is a cold reminder. The wind still cuts through him like her smiles could, disarms him as easily as one of her laughs, and needing a song to help a man march is ridiculous; Ygritte was right. 

About everything. 

Mostly about him. How to hold on and never let go. 

"What is this tune?" Tormund asks. "It sounds jaunty, but Top Knot has a voice like a squalling pig."

"You'd like it," Beric assures him, helpless to keep from sniggering even _with_ all the frost in his beard making it difficult for his jaw (like a fucking anvil, Gods help Tormund, if he ever wa nte d a _m_ an) to move. "It's about a fair maiden. Like your Brienne of Tarth."

"Isn't fucking everything about a woman?" Sloshing through the snow, Sandor grumps along with his face all angry-like. 

There's laughing Sandor, snorting Sandor, Sandor shivering under his fur, hungry Sandor, angry Sandor, GRR, GRR, GRR. 

"It certainly seems so," Jorah agrees. "How did the one go? I loved a maid as fair as -- I can't recall it. Summer in her hair?"

"Fire in her hair," Tormund interrupts, never mind he's no idea how it goes. "They're the fairest women. Snow's sister, Snow's wife."

"Watch it," Jon warns quickly, but for which girl?

"A royal wedding," Thoros grins, tugging his furs closer around his face. "Who's the lucky lass? Had I been invited, I would have practiced my curtsy."

"I had no idea," Jorah intones. And -- no, gods, no, he doesn't sound relieved or anything, but which man hasn't fallen in love with his Queen? Better men have and lesser men have, in a way. He wouldn't be surprised if Tyrion had fallen for her . Body or mind, it makes no matter when her. _Her_. 

He resigns to not die out here. He thought he would never see her again, and that in itself. Gods. 

"It ended," is all Jon can figure to say. It's easy almost, like they can figure he left her behind or she missed her freedom. They could figure anything better than the truth, an arrow, and the stench of her burning corpse still a component in his dreams.

"Annulment is discouraged by the Lord of Light."

"Yes, but it isn't drinking," Gendry snaps, kicking up the confounded snow. 

"Begging your pardons, Your Grace," Thoros amends. Why their seven have come to a halt, well, only the gods know. 

"It's fine."

"It was careless. I guess I know nothing, Jon Snow, of social delicacy," Thoros intones with this -- this _smirk_ he swallows his ale with, and while Jon feels everything in him constrict, his ribs going concave, his heart beating all wrong, Tormund draws his spear as quick as a blink. 

"You demon!" he thunders, pointing his weapon at the priest. "You're like the red witch! You shouldn't be able to see those things!"

As he moves to strike, though, Beric is there with his sword aflame, and the steel rings amidst the silence. The sparks scatter, and as the fire licks outwards, moves like it's of a hive mind with the flaming god himself, it touches who it needs to. It doesn't take a life yet, but maybe if Tormund would have known how this venture would end, if Gendry knew, if the Hound knew as sparks spray too close to his face and he stumbles in the snow in an effort to back away. They each might have been kinder. 

"You truly want to cross blades?" Ser Beric asks him, smiling with all the silent certainty of a man who's found death. 

"I would die for King Snow," Tormund swears, teeth bared with all the loyalty that statement dictates; just rise, Tormund the True, anointed, first knight in his Kingsguard, 

"No," Jon quietly says. So slowly, he reaches for Tormund's arm, guides it down. "You don't have to die for Ygritte," he murmurs. It's a still, small thing. "She's already dead."

"This cunt is no better than the red woman Melisandre, Snow."

"Perhaps not," Jon says. He doesn't grin at all when Gendry gripes _definitely not_ , no. "But we're all living. We've all got something to fight for. Live for."

"Brienne of Tarth," Beric helpfully reminds Tormund. "Your maiden fair."

"Don't speak of her."

"All three of you, shut your holes," the Hound groans, wrapping his arms tight around himself. "I'm going mad. I can't feel my balls," he adds, sighing. 

"We might do well to find shelter," Jorah suggests quietly. "I think we've traveled enough today. The Dothraki grew testy when they overheated."

"Overheated," Gendry repeats in a huff, just taking the slight for what it is. "I'll never be warm again."

"You will," Jon swears to him, stoic. "We'll camp."

"I was thinking this would be a day-long trek," the Hound says. "Into the North then out. We don't have to dilly-dally. Pick flowers and braid each others' hair."

The rest of them just sorta stare, shrug. "Could we light a fire?" Thoros pipes up. 

"Listen, I hadn't planned on no fucking slumber fest. Those two bloody fanatics, they snore like bears. I say, we keep walking."

"There has to be hours of light left," Tormund agrees, doing this thing with his brows. "We'll use them to find shelter. We don't want to be out here past nightfall. You know what walks the earth, Dog?"

"I've seen enough."

"Alright," Gendry cuts in. "If we're dead either way, what harm can a fire really do? I can barely see five feet in front of me."

"Feet," Tormund repeats. "Look a man in the eye, lad. Don't be staring at his feet."

"Fuck's sake," Sandor groans, squinting overhead. "It's how we measure distance. Fucking uncultured shit. How long have you been south of the Wall?"

"We don't measure spaces like that," Tormund replies nonchalantly. "We measure with a Wildling's embrace. Or our _dicks_. You want to see?"

"Seven burning hells."

"I'll gladly burn right now."

"I'll get your blood burning," Tormund outright whoops 'cause it makes Gendry look so embarrassed. "He's prettier than you, Snow, I swear it. Jaw like a razor's edge."

Jon just shakes his head, tries again not to grin. It's eerie, still being able to feel her. "Have you ever seen eyes that blue?"

"Brienne of Tarth's," he contradicts. 

Jorah actually growls like an old, bloody bear. "Are we going on or not?"

Gendry decides he's going to go stand over there by him. Where it's safe. "We're wasting time."

"Aye," Beric agrees. He distrustingly looks at Tormund, though, so next time they cross blades -- 

"I won't listen to the Young Bear speak anymore," Tormund gruffs.

For the eighth time in as many minutes, Jorah rolls his eyes. "I've no qualm with your people. How often must I tell you? I'm trying to be practical."

"I don't trust a Mormont. They smell like piss. And hatred."

"Not too long ago, you swore to never trust a Stark," Jon reminds him. 

Yet they dredge on regardless, each one not quite sure if they're gaining ground or seeking shelter. Each one wonders which will be the first to complain of hunger, but alas. Old steel, forged steel, uncultured steel, steel on fire: none bend so easy. 

As they each trod over a downed tree, Jon tries to do a cursory look over each of these fools to be certain they're each still breathing fine. Unsurprisingly, not one of them inspires much confidence. 

Not the Hound slipping on ice and falling flat on his arse again, not Thoros drunkenly laughing with all this bliss of inebriation (he doesn't see Sandor kick his leg out so they're both a tangle of limbs with snow in their hair). Not Jorah who begins to shuffle who reminds Jon's worried look that he's spent a whole new lifetime in the warm heat of the lands across the sea. Not Beric who asks him in all serious, "What do you do up here when you have to take a piss?" And not Gendry who cheerfully and mournfully says to Jon, "I'm losing feeling in my feets," in a tone that reminds him of Sam and Grenn and summer and has him laughing in memory of. 

He answers, "It's best to keep walking," while they smile at each other like how in all the hells have two bastards ended up here? Among a Wildling King and knights of valor, a King's own bastard and the only Baratheon heir with the King in the North: two boys that probably should have been dead long before now, two boys with ice in their beards and chips on their shoulders the Kingsroad wide, two boys who are still children playing at war. 

Say what you will about forming friendships, but being stranded in a frozen tundra is a surefire catalyst to trust. At least for these two. With Jon wanting to ask him about Arya just as much as Gendry wants to do the same. 

With Jorah pausing to rest for just a moment, with the Hound giving up all fucking pretense. "Leave me here to freeze," he grumbles, leaning against a tree. "I'll thaw come spring."

"We stay together," Jon refuses. "No matter what. We can kill each other after we defeat the wights. Until then, braid each other's hair. Sing songs around the fire tonight. Giggle over fleeting flights of fancy for all I care. Just don't give up, Clegane."

"Think of your maid with hair like summer," Tormund suggests as he hauls him up. "Snow's sister, aye?"

"That fragile bird," he gruffs, standing and breathing in this deep frigid air and _hating_ it almost as much as he hated the air thick with smoke that night. 

If Jon thinks anything of that, he doesn't let on. "She grew up, Sandor."

"Aye, the South men say she's got fangs between her lips down there," Tormund agrees. "She's a fearsome thing."

" _Tormund_."

"It is what they say, Jon Snow. Because I'm your friend, I don't say what they say about your cock."

And maybe it's guilt. Maybe it's just loneliness in being surrounded by six and more in this vast, open winter, it's all consuming regret. "And the other one," the Hound asks stiffly. "What do they say about her?"

"I don't know that one."

"She has the King's eyes," Gendry speaks up real lowly. "And his smile. They have the same laugh."

"Young love," Thoros quips again. If Tom were here, he'd finish the rest of this sonnet. "You never forget your first. Or that's what they say. I can't remember her face no more than I can remember life before R'hllor."

"That's lovely, you prick."

"Imbecile," he chides the Hound. "You ever have a maiden fair or were you too grumpy to draw a lass's eye?"

"Piss off."

"How's it go?" Jorah wonders again. "All round and brown and covered in hair?"

Tormund makes a face. "Your balls?"

"I swear on your life," Jorah threatens calmly. "I wouldn't fall asleep tonight if I were you."

"It's the song," Gendry interrupts before anyone else can pull weapons and hack each other to frozen bits. Bleeding Stranger. " _The Bear and the Maiden Fair_. You'd like it, I think."

"He licked the honey from her hair, is how it goes."

"Now that'll keep you warm," Tormund shudders, taking pause. "Anyone got any stories? Daylight's burning."

"So the red woman tied you to a bed," Thoros goads Gendry, nudging him with his flask. "Then what'd she do?"

"We've got a long walk ahead, lad; be descriptive." 

"You _sold_ me to her."

"And I'd do it again. The gold helped the men."

"If I had still been there," Gendry says, his voice picking up like _anger_ , like the stubbornness he could throw back in their teeth, steel beat under his hands. "You might not have lost her."

"You can't know that," Beric sadly sympathizes. "Don't be so hard on yourself. We could have delivered her safely to the Twins. She could have sat next to her mum during her uncle's wedding. Where would your anger be then, boy? It doesn't do well to weep for the dead or the living."

"Who's going to cry for you if we all freeze to death before sundown?" the Hound says to redirect his own guilt. He almost saw Arya safely to the wedding, too. 

"I won't freeze," Tormund thoughtfully decides. "I might use your insides for warmth, but I'd shed a tear. I'd mourn you, Clovis."


	4. four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Did you just agree with him? You'll eat people?"
> 
> "Apparently, just the men."
> 
> "It's a lawless land north of the Wall," Jon shrugs, this warm mass of ice-encrusted fur. "Every man for himself."
> 
> "Gods above," Gendry whispers. "The legends are true."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is short and has taken far too long, but this journey is never-ending and will exist forever in my heart.

"We rest here," says Jon.

Ironically, Sandor just grunts, gives all the men (except his new best friend, Jorah) the cold shoulder.

"We just stopped," Beric protests. "We won't make any progress at this rate."

"Southron blood freezes quickly," Jon argues with all the sage wisdom of someone who has actually seen the dead no matter how his followers start to doubt him.

"This might not be so bad," Gendry mutters. "If winter comes, we can die peacefully in our frozen sleep."

"I'll be sure to get you a blanket," Thoros cracks.

Tormund leans unnaturally close to Jon. It makes Sandor grimace. "When night falls, Jon," he hushes, rasping and thick with cold, "we eat that pretty boy first."

"All right."

"Did you just agree with him? You'll eat people?"

"Apparently, just the men."

"It's a lawless land north of the Wall," Jon shrugs, this warm mass of ice-encrusted fur. "Every man for himself."

"Gods above," Gendry whispers. "The legends are true."

"Gossip," Jorah snaps. "Harsh words and hardly any of them are true."

"I know you couldn't read the legends," Beric tells him. It's a gentle but direct stab, just another knife in his back. "How did you come to hear about Wildlings beyond the Wall?"

"Oh. I didn't expect that question."

"Everyone knows," the Hound huffs. "Scary stories to frighten children. Mum would threaten to leave me out for the Wildlings when I misbehaved."

"It's not us you have to worry about, man. We don't bite hard."

"Yes," Sandor says singularly, shoving Tormund away from him.

"Arya -- your sister," Gendry flusters, gesturing with his hands.

Jon closes his eyes. "I know her, yes."

"She would tell me that Nan told her that Wildlings eat children and old folk."

"What?" Gods, help, Jon actually laughs, but it is far too cold and the air is far too thin to waste on laughter. "I had forgotten."

"You believe such lies?"

"I used to. Oh, gods."

"I eat meat," Tormund hisses with vitriol. His reddened face is starting to peel from the cold. "At Castle Black, I eat POTATOES."

"We'll need each man we have," Jon remembers from earlier -- the point. The focus. Their confounded purpose here in the first place. "We'll stop often so no one weakens too harshly."

"Does it get more difficult to breathe?" Thoros wonders. "The higher we go, I mean."

"I feel fine."

"Gendry, did I feckin’ ask?"

"Leave the boy alone," the Hound sighs, truly looking quite cross with his hood all up over his face. He looks so grumpy that it would be comical and will be when they're all cozy around a hearth once more. A story they’ll tell their children, _a pretty girl like her, a strong boy, maybe a dozen._ The wind jovially laughs, and snow swirls up like it’s dancing amidst the trees, calling to him, sighing,

"Are you his authority?"

"He's decent," Sandor now awkwardly and uncomfortably has to justify. He takes a fistful of snow. For four whole days of his lifetime, he had to listen to Gendry did this and Gendry did that and Gendry believes and Gendry thinks and Gendry once said the most comical thing -- "This won't end well if we kill each other on the way."

"Ser Sandor Clegane the Pacifist. I'll write you a song," Beric quips.

"Make it jaunty."

"I didn't think you knew that word. Call me impressed."

"I'll call you something, all right."

"I've been thinking," states Jon, interrupting their spat not quite as subtly as he intended. "I think it's best I go the rest of the way alone."

“Jaunty,” echoes Gendry. “Did you attend many feasts in King’s Landing? Did you dance?”

“Can you imagine him stompin’ his large, ugly feet?”

“Nice feet,” grunts Tormund, approvingly. When Sandor peers at him with disdain through his icy lashes, Tormund blinks once, hard.

“Did you whirl any lasses across the floor?”

“Any men?”

“You’re a sight, after all.”

“The air’s so thin. Isn’t it so thin?”

“You should have seen the dances of the Dothraki,” interrupts Jorah, taking a stance that implies wisdom and reverence but really just allows him to support his aching lower back. “Purposeful twirls and shouts that moved each part of the body. There’s nothing like it here.”

“Why don’t you go on back there,” suggests Tormund. “Take your false Queen away so King Crow can lead the Kingdoms.”

“How many of the Kingdoms will you claim?”

“Only one,” answers Tormund before Jon can wager _ideally, none_.

“That’s grand,” Gendry says, voice thin, gasping. “Unity. Peace, aye, one Kingdom. One land.”

“The Kingdom of me arse,” Tormund whispers.

When Jon collapses in the snow, everyone is both disturbed yet grateful. At least, they are until they realize he won’t wake up.


End file.
